Thursday, February 19, 2015

In case the few remaining readers have been wondering where I've been, quite a bit of my time in the past week has been dedicated to writing a new edition of Shiur Theatre - "Esther's War" - for our Beit Midrash. In a presentation this Shabbos, we will look at the halachic and ethical questions raised by the bloodshed, and fear-based conversion, that occurred in the events of the original Purim.

I don't expect to share the script here (at least, not until I see how it is received on Shabbos...), but here is the accompanying source sheet. I don't imagine it will be all that intelligible without the script, but some of the sources may be interesting. It is also downloadable in pdf here.

One who converts in order to partake of a royal table,
or to be among Solomon's servants, is not a valid convert, per Rabbi Nechemiah.
For Rabbi Nechemiah said: Those who have converted for fear of wild animals or
due to dreams, and those who converted in the days of Mordechai and Esther,
are not valid converts…

Rav said: The law follows the view that they are all
valid converts [after the fact].

But doesn't the Talmud (Yevamot 79a) say regarding the
event with the Gibeonites in King David's day, that 150,000 people converted? Perhaps
they converted independently, as occurred in the days of Mordechai and
Esther…

The invasion of Canaan: Does the Torah endorse
bloodshed beyond self-defense, and looting?

And on the third day, when they were in pain, two sons
of Yaakov, Shimon and Levi, brothers of Dinah, took their swords and came upon
the secure city, and killed every male. And they killed Chamor and his son
Shechem by the sword, and they took Dinah from the house of Shechem, and they
left. The sons of Yaakov came upon the corpses and despoiled the city, for
contaminating their sister.

And these are the kings of the land whom Yehoshua and
the Children of Israel struck… One was the king of Jericho, one was the king of
Ai beside Bethel. One was the king of Jerusalem, one was the king of Hebron.
One was the king of Yarmut, one was the king of Lachish… all of the kings
were 31.

7.Devarim 20:10

כִּי־תִקְרַב אֶל־עִיר לְהִלָּחֵם עָלֶיהָ וְקָרָאתָ אֵלֶיהָ לְשָׁלוֹם:

When you draw near to a city, to battle it, you shall
call to it for peace.

"When you go to war against
your enemy" – A midrash emphasizes, "against your enemy – you wage
war against your enemies." The Torah establishes that you will battle
only those who show themselves to be your enemy, from whose enmity you have
suffered, and from whom you anticipate acts of enmity. Therefore, even should
you strike them, you shall only defend yourself. This message rejects all wars
of conquest.

Noachides are obligated to establish judges in every
place to judge these six commands and instruct the nation… and this is why all
of the members of Shechem were liable for death. Shechem kidnapped, and they
saw and knew and did not judge him…

There are insufficient grounds to permit action
against a community that refuses to fulfill its obligation and eliminate
murderers from their midst, so long as they may have the excuse of fear,
pressure and the like.

Deuteronomy 20:10 says, "you shall call to it for
peace", but that is where they have not acted upon Israel. Where they have
acted toward Israel, such as here [Shechem] where they had broken forth, doing
this repellent thing, then even though only one of them had done it, since
they had attacked first, Israel was permitted to respond. So, too, for all
wars, even where only one of them had acted, he is part of the nation. Since
they attacked first, we were permitted to go to war against them…

We may not declare war upon
any human being, anywhere, until we first sue for peace.
This applies both to "authorized wars" and "obligatory
wars," as it is written, "When you draw near to a city to fight
against her, you shall call to her for peace." Should they make peace and
accept the laws in which Noachides are instructed, we would not kill anyone
there. We would collect taxes, as it is written, "They will be tribute to
you, and will serve you."

Now the disgrace begins, and
we do not intend to cover it up. Had they killed Shechem and Chamor, justice
would certainly have been with them. But they did not spare the defenseless
men who were given into their hands, who had no strength. Worse, they
looted, and generally made the inhabitants pay for the crime of their
master. For this there was no justification.

When there is no substantive risk to our soldiers, there is no permission to strike lives or property.
However, when there is a discernible risk, one must remember that it is not
only a matter of weighing one unit opposite a civilian population on the scale.
The loss of one unit, or part of it, can affect the entire battle…

The price [of war] is also paid by the enemy, who is
also graced with the Divine image, and one should grieve whenever G-d's creations drown in the sea. On
this point, the issue of quantity is meaningful, and one certainly must weigh
the justifications for harming many in order to save an individual.

The eternal war with Amalek: Where does it come from,
and where is it going?

19.Verses of Amalek

Bereishit 36:12 Amalek is the
grandson of Esav

Shemot 17 Amalek's first unprovoked attack in the
wilderness

Bamidbar 14 Amalek's second unprovoked attack in the
wilderness

Devarim 25 Amalek's first unprovoked attack in the
wilderness, re-told

If any people seeks to
destroy us, we are commanded to do battle against it when it
rises up against us, and this battle of ours is an obligatory war on the basis
of the verse from Exodus (17:16), "The Lord will have war with Amalek
from generation to generation."

In the spring of 2004, as this book was slouching
toward completion, Jeffrey Goldberg reported in theNew Yorkerabout a series of disturbIing
interviews he had recently conducted with Jewish settlers in the West Bank and
Gaza. "The Palestinians are Amalek," he was told by Benzi Lieberman,
chairman of the Council of Settlements. "We will destroy them,"
Lieberman continued. "We won't kill them all. But we will destroy their
ability to think as a nation. We will destroy Palestinian nationalism."
And Moshe Feiglin, a leading Likud activist, told Goldberg: "The Arabs
engage in typical Amalek behavior. I can't prove this genetically, but this is
the behavior of Amalek."

And Esther said: If it would be good before the king,
and if I have found favour before him, and if it would be appropriate before
the king, and if I would be good in his eyes, let it be recorded to retract
the scrolls, the plan of Haman son of Hamedata the Aggagite, who has
written to destroy the Jews in all of the king's lands!...

And King Achashverosh said to Queen Esther and to Mordechai
the Jew: Behold, I have given the house of Haman to Esther, and they have hung
him upon the tree for sending his hand against the Jews. Now, write upon the
Jews as is good in your eyes in the name of the king, and seal it with the
king's ring, for one may not retract a text written in the king's name and
sealed with the king's ring.

And he wrote in the name of King Achashverosh… that
the king had permitted the Jews of every city to gather and stand upon their
lives, to destroy and kill and eliminate the collective might of the nations
who had besieged them, children and women, and take their spoils.

And the Jews of Shushan gathered on the 14th
of Adar as well, and they killed in Shushan 300 men, and they did not extend
their hand to the spoils. And the rest of the Jews in the king's lands
gathered and stood for their lives, and gained reprieve from their foes,
and killed their enemies, 75,000, and they did not extend their hand
to the spoils.